Shippers Budgeting Flat for 2026 Face Capacity Crunch, ITS Logistics Warns

## Capacity Warning Signals Tightening Freight Market Ahead Shippers who have planned flat transportation budgets for 2026 may be caught off guard by a tightening capacity environment, according to senior executives at ITS Logistics, as reported by FreightWaves. The California-based third-party logistics provider is cautioning that a confluence of structural pressures — including accelerating driver attrition, elevated fuel costs, and historically lean inventory levels — is creating conditions that could rapidly erode available freight capacity across North American supply chains. ### Key Pressure Points According to ITS Logistics, the warning centres on three interlocking dynamics: - **Driver exits:** An ageing driver workforce and ongoing recruitment challenges are reducing the pool of available capacity at a pace that flat-rate budget assumptions fail to account for. - **Fuel cost volatility:** Persistent uncertainty in energy markets continues to place upward pressure on carrier operating costs, which are increasingly being passed through to shippers. - **Lean inventories:** With many shippers having deliberately run down stock levels in recent years, any demand uptick is likely to generate rapid, concentrated freight surges that strain available capacity. ### Industry Implications The warning from ITS Logistics reflects a broader concern within the logistics sector that the current period of relative freight market softness may be masking underlying structural vulnerabilities. Carriers and 3PLs have been operating in a prolonged rate-correction cycle following the post-pandemic freight boom, but executives argue this has lulled some shippers into assuming stable or declining costs will persist. For maritime-adjacent supply chains — particularly those reliant on intermodal connections between port terminals and inland distribution networks — a domestic trucking capacity squeeze would compound existing port congestion and vessel scheduling pressures, potentially extending dwell times and disrupting just-in-time cargo flows. Industry analysts recommend that shippers review contractual freight arrangements and consider securing capacity commitments ahead of any market tightening, rather than relying on spot market availability. *Source: FreightWaves / ITS Logistics*